Use of Screen Real Estate on University Home Pages.

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In this project, the home pages of the 11 comprehensive universities in the
University of Wisconsin System were analyzed and compared according to categories
suggested by Jakob Nielsen. This research clearly defines eight categories of screen
real estate and then uses them to compare home pages of each university. Results show
that the universities do not use space efficiently and that they vary according to how
they use their Web sites for such things as promoting themselves or providing content
of interest. Design suggestions are offered for improving the allocation of screen
real estate on university home pages: use design that takes advantage of the entire
screen; allocate more space to content of interest and navigation; and limit use of self promotion
content and filler.